Editorial Board Guest Author

Daniel Lafferty

Director of Music & Voice, PHMG

Daniel Lafferty is Director of Music and Voice at PHMG, the world's largest audio branding agency with more than 32,000 clients in 39 countries.

Mr. Lafferty has been with the company since 2010, helping businesses across the globe to harness the full potential of audio branding.

Drawing on his extensive background in music, psychoacoustics and the influence of sound on human behaviour, Mr. Lafferty leads finely-tuned bespoke music and voice workshops with organizations, enabling them to understand and explore all of the elements of their brand to create a unique Brand-Sound-Track™ - the exclusive piece of music that encapsulates their company's identity.

Mr. Lafferty looks after the creative talent at PHMG, providing strategic and artistic direction to composers, producers, engineers, voiceover artists and copywriters, to ensure the seamless implementation of a client's new audio branding service.

By developing relationships with world-leading composers and voice artists, he continues to develop and enhance the roster of creative talent at PHMG.

Over the last five years, Mr. Lafferty has been fundraising for PHMG's charitable arm, the PHMG Foundation, helping to raise almost $370,000 for almost 70 different organizations around the world. He most recently climbed Snowdon and also took part in an unusual charity challenge banning him from using the lifts at PHMG's twelfth-floor Manchester office - a distance equal to 7 times the Empire State Building.

Author's Articles

Revenue Management: Focus On Profit

Revenue Management is still a relatively new profession within hotel operations and as such, it continues to evolve. One significant trend in this area is a shift away from using revenue as the foundation to generate key performance indicators (KPIs) and to instead place the emphasis on profit. Traditionally, revenue managers have relied on total revenue per available room (TrevPAR) and revenue per available room (RevPAR) as the basis of their KPIs. Now, some revenue managers are using gross operating profit per available room (GOPPAR) as their primary KPI. This puts profit at the center of revenue management strategy, and managers are increasingly searching for new ways to increase the profitability of their hotels. Return on Investment is the objective of any hotel investment, so it is only logical that profitability and ROI will be emphasized going forward. Another trend is an expanded focus on direct hotel bookings. Revenue managers know that one way to increase profitability is to steer guests away from online travel agencies (OTAs) and book directly with the hotel. This tactic also reinforces brand identity and loyalty, and encourages repeat business. In addition, it provides a valuable platform to market the hotel directly to the customer, and to upsell room upgrades or other services to them. Another trend for revenue managers involves automation in their software programs. Revenue management systems with automation are far more desirable than those without it. Automating data entry and logistics increases efficiency, allowing managers to spend more time on formulating strategy. As a bonus, an automated system helps with aggregating and interpreting data. The October issue of the Hotel Business Review will address these developments and document how some leading hotels are executing their revenue management strategies.